Good Luck Being Born Tomorrow! (part 2 of 2)

Silver Keskküla
|
April 9, 2015

Since my controversial
post last week, 2.4 million more babies were born into this world,
97% of them into places that lack certain freedoms. Opinions vary on
which of these freedoms are more important than others, but the fact remains
-

No one is born into a perfect place.

Add a few more layers to the controversial mix and we could easily
paint the whole world red. And that all covers just the “being
born” part - the one we don’t have control over. Now lets get into what
we can actually do about the rest.

When the environment is (or turns) difficult, you have a choice between
adapting or moving. There’s a third choice
as well, but I’ll get to that later.

Both adaptation and migration are common in nature.
Adaptation in fact explains most of the diversity of animal
species we see today (It just so happens that I’m posting this
from the Galápagos Islands).
Be it a furry coat or the ability to hibernate to survive winters, evolution
has found means to increase the odds of survival. We humans are great at it
too – look at our skin color or our ability to bend over under authoritarian
regimes. We do what it takes to survive.

The second choice - migration is found in all major animal
groups (birds, mammals, fish, reptiles, insects and even crustaceans). The
Estonian national bird – the barn swallow - only spends a few months a year
in Estonia (which in itself is amusing). It’s among the 18% of bird
species that migrate long distances, mostly to escape winters.

Humans are no exception when it comes to migration. There are a quarter
billion people in the world who now live permanently in a country other than
the one they were born in (3.2% of world population), 7.6% of
them are qualified as refugees. Looking back at the history of migration, if
you’re not in Africa right now, then you’re at least a descendant of people
who have moved continents (maybe something for racists to think about?).

The big difference between human and animal migration is that we humans often
limit our freedom to imagined communities
- socially constructed, artificial groups, imagined by the people who
perceive themselves as part of them. That’s essentially what nation states
are – imagined - since they are not based on face-to-face interactions
between its members like actual communities.

Pangaea (Pangea) – a supercontinent

300 million years ago, a supercontinent called Pangaea was formed, that later
broke apart into continents that we inhabit today. Modern technology has
turned the world back into Pangaea – a world where everything is connected.
You can have a live video call with someone across the world in seconds
(you’re welcome!) or you can find yourself on the next continent in 10 hours
if the need be. Yet we’ve built these imaginary borders around us that limit
human potential. These borders are a direct result of historic military
conflict. And allowing your fate to be determined by things that took place
before your birth feels like accepting defeat before you even get started.

It is the magic of nationalism to turn chance into destiny”Benedict Anderson

This all brings me to the third option of what to do when the environment is
not favorable – you can change it! As weird as it sounds, one of the
means to cause change is actually also to migrate (for those who already have
that freedom). As opposed to a slow democratic process of giving your
marginal vote every four years in the hope of changing something you care
about, you can vote with
your feet already today. You have a choice between expressing your needs
at a popularity contest twice a decade or putting constant pressure on
places.

Not only will you find yourself in a place where your problem is already
fixed (remember – that’s why you moved!), you’re also putting real budget
pressure on the old place by taking your taxes elsewhere (will hurt every
month). With enough people doing that, the competition for taxes forces
incumbent states to fix their environments.

In positive
political theory, this is described as the Tiebout hypothesis. The
basic argument is that competition between governments reduces their ability
to redistribute wealth, since whoever is being taxed to pay for the
redistribution can just move to somewhere with lower taxes. These effects of
course are not only limited to taxes.

Though the suggestion to “Just move!” from the pen of the affluent
might come off as insensitive toward the 3rd world citizens (who might be
lacking the freedom to move), there is however one major thing that injects
endless hope in me - the advances in technology.

Call me a techno-optimist, but I see technology as the greatest equalizer (of
all time) that can help bring more and more people along. Software
is eating the world, because
Mobile is eating the world. In Sub-Saharan Africa, 70%
of the population is now under cellular coverage. Another 1B
people are coming online and 80% of adults on earth are
expected to have a smartphone by 2020. These are all people connected to the
global market.

Legacy free environments with low resources are also quite conducive to
innovation. It is likely that African countries will see more success with
online education, bitcoin, 3d printing, drones etc. They lack the legacy that
would slow them down and the latest technology is often the only
practical/affordable solution to problems (online learning in remote
locations, doctors 3d printing prosthetics in remote locations, drones
stopping poaching, micro transactions on mobiles the only affordable option
etc.).

Though not exactly a shift from the third world, but nevertheless an example
of how a
clean sheet and technology can make a difference - Estonia
(1.3M population) has created two unicorns (Skype and
TransferWise) since regaining its independence from the USSR. A fresh start
with the latest technology has enabled the country to quickly catch up. The
states e-services in fact have been so successful that Estonia is now
offering them to the residents of other countries through the e-residency
program.

It’s not hard to imagine the invention of blockchain (the core of Bitcoin)
having remarkable implications in the developing world through enabling
micro-transactions and possibly helping eliminate corruption through
blockchain based electronic voting. There’s stuff coming that we haven’t even
thought of yet.

Technological innovation is finally making it possible to meet the
assumptions of the Tiebout model (mobile consumers, complete information,
abundant choices, telecommuting etc.). Bringing transparency into the world
of basic freedoms, taxes, government services, public goods and reducing the
cost/pain associated with moving will be the way to give us a future,
where every nation state will have to compete for every
citizen. Can you imagine that world?

A world where every country (or every city) is utterly committed to make
itself the best environment for the people (not just corporations)

A world where every citizen has a complete picture of what they get for
their taxes compared to every other citizen of the world

A world where people already on the move spark the change in even the
most hopeless places

A world where transparency through technology is making it harder and
harder for states to limit freedoms or get away with non-optimal governance.

A world where isolation is not a viable option for any state

A world where free people move!

Rest assured, there are many challenges on the way and this vision might
raise more questions than it provides answers to, but I certainly would like
to see this future.

That’s why we’re building Teleport and that’s why we want to invite you along
for this ride. Go ahead, install the
Teleport for Startup Cities app (Android
and iOS) and give it a
try! See how even the 100 startup friendly cities differ. You guys are the
first! You guys are already the most mobile. You guys are the future of
everyone else!

I’ll leave you with Russell
Brand’s pun on anti-immigration practices for the sceptics among you:

Keep still on this spherical
rock in infinite space. Keep still on this spherical rock with imaginary
geopolitical borders that have been drawn in according to the economic
reality at the time. Do not pause to reflect upon the fact that the free
movement of global capital will necessitate free movement of a global labor
force to meet that demand. That is a complex economic idea and you can't
understand it! Just keep still on the rock!